


Feral Creatures

by blynk_kitt



Category: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher Series - Andrzej Sapkowski
Genre: Deaf Link (Legend of Zelda), Gen, Geralt is a horse boy, Geralt loves the giant horse, Geralt seems talkative compared to Link, Link has zero regard for personal space, More tags to be added, Post BotW, Soft Geralt of Rivia, but he’s a sweetheart
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-16
Updated: 2020-03-17
Packaged: 2021-02-28 19:26:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23172400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blynk_kitt/pseuds/blynk_kitt
Summary: Geralt of Rivia finds himself stranded in Hyrule, which is half worrisome and half fortunate, as he’s been looking for a way to avoid destiny for a little longer.Basically: 2 angsty quiet horse boys travel together and dodge responsibilities.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia &; Link (The Legend of Zelda)
Comments: 11
Kudos: 88





	Feral Creatures

**Author's Note:**

> The world is ending, and here I am, writing fanfic instead of my senior thesis bc I’m going to graduate from my bedroom and everything is stupid.

This is the reason Geralt hates portals so much.

Firstly, he hadn’t even known he was being portaled until he’d already stepped through. He’d been dealing with a particularly rude druid who hadn’t wanted to pay him. The druid had directed him down a hallway, claiming his lab was a turn away. And Geralt had gone around the corner and suddenly found himself in-between.

And now he’d been portaled right into the ocean.

He’s knocked over almost immediately by a wave, but he’s not over his head. While the sea is rough, he’s not far from shore. He’s exhausted when he reaches it, and it’s also a little too cold for comfort. The night breeze sends a chill up his spine.

And of course, for as far as he can see, there’s just beach, and about fifty yards away from shore, cliffs. Great.

He hikes further in towards the cliffs (past where he can see the high-tide line), chops down a palm tree, and builds a small fire. He sits with his back towards the wind so it doesn’t blow out. He’ll walk the beach in the morning and see if he can find the best place to scale the cliffs. Right now, he’s tired and cold and miserable.

* * *

Geralt jerks back awake when he smells wet dog. It’s still a ways off, but if he can smell the dog, the dog can smell him. He glances at the moon—it’s been about three hours since he first collapsed by the fire.

He stares down the beach. Sure enough, he can see a dog hopping through the water, followed closely by someone on horseback. They’re still a long way off. Geralt stays sitting by the embers of his fire, but keeps his sword close.

Sure enough, a few minutes later the dog comes sprinting for him. As it draws closer he notices the thick fur, the slim muzzle—a wolf. However, its body language reads as curious, not aggressive, so Geralt doesn’t bother to fend it off. It stands about three feet away, just staring and sniffing. It turns when the man on horseback whistles, and then trots back over to walk by the horse’s side. Geralt lifts his gaze to look and can’t believe his eyes.

The horse is huge.

Geralt has seen his fair share of draft horses, but this one towers all of them by quite a few inches. She looms all the larger by the man perched on her back, who seems a bit shorter than average. He pulls the horse to a stop and jumps down (yes, jumps: that horse had to be  _ at least _ 19 hands). The man has a sword and bow strapped to his back, and as he steps closer, Geralt can see two pointed ears peeking out from a mess of blond hair. 

“You’re welcome to share the fire,” Geralt says, in Hen Llinge. When the stranger doesn’t respond, he repeats himself, in the common tongue. Perhaps the stranger is a half-breed and didn’t speak Hen Llinge.

The elf smiles, and whistles again. He leaves the horse, but he and the wolf take off down to the ocean.

Geralt sees them splashing around for a moment, but quickly returns his attention to that beautiful horse. Her fur is dark, but her mane and tail are far lighter; it’s a color that might be a ginger in proper daylight. He can’t help himself. He stands and wanders over without even registering that he’s doing it. The horse snorts at him as he reaches up to put a hand to her velvety nose.

Fuck, he misses Roach.

The horse bends down to push against his head, happy for the affection. Geralt scratches her under the chin, and everywhere else he can reach.

He doesn’t know how long he stands there, just enjoying being in this majestic creature’s presence. He’s interrupted by the return of the elf and the wolf—the elf with an armful of fish, the wolf dragging a large fish of his own.

“You horse is lovely,” Geralt says.

The elf ignores him, grabbing a knife from his bag and laying out the fish.

Geralt helps bring the fire back to life as the elf guts the fish. The elf pops two fish onto a pair of sharpened sticks, and sits next to Geralt at the fire. He’s close, leaving only a foot between them. From here, Geralt can see he’s young—eighteen at most.

He breaks the silence: “You’re young to be—”

The elf reaches out and moves Geralt’s face so he’s looking at him directly. “—traveling alone,” he finishes. It’s strange behavior. And the elf has no response to his statement except to shrug, and dig through his bag.

He pulls out a few jars of spices. He pops the cork of one and holds it up to Geralt’s nose, eyebrows raised. Geralt sniffs—it’s something close to black pepper, but a little sweeter. “That’s good,” he says.

The elf goes through each one, letting Geralt smell all of them, often reaching out to direct Geralt’s face to look at his own when Geralt looks away. He uses the spice that Geralt responded to most on one of the fish. Soon the fish are crackling and the smell is heavenly. The elf hands him a steaming fish and eats his own quickly. The wolf, munching his own, looks up every once in a while, and the elf tosses him a bite of his fish.

When they finish, the elf sighs, laying back in the sand, looking content.

“Thank you,” Geralt says.

The elf smiles, waving his hand toward his chest. The wolf finishes up his fish and meanders over. Geralt holds out his hand and the wolf sniffs at him before curling up next to the elf.

“I am Geralt of Rivia.” The introduction feels a little unnecessary—surely if the elf wanted to know, he would have asked. But it would be better to get introductions out of the way in case if his reputation had traveled all this way, and the elf decided he no longer wanted to hang around with the “Butcher of Blaviken”.

He gets little reaction, just a nod. And then the elf holds up his hand and signs out a word.

“I’m sorry, I don’t know signs,” Geralt says. He feels a bit foolish for not realizing the elf was deaf sooner. The elf sits up and writes “L-I-N-K” into the sand with a finger.

“Thank you for the fish, Link,” Geralt says. “I am also lost, could you—” he trails off when Link stops watching his lips and instead focuses on the strange stone tablet he pulls from his belt. It lights up with some magic Geralt has never seen before, and Link holds it out to him.

The tablet is lighter than he’s expecting, but there’s a glowing map set into the stone, outlined in blue. Link leans over, and taps a spot on the beach, then points to a diamond on the map labelled “Lurelin”. It doesn’t look very far, but Geralt also doesn’t know the scale of the map.

“Hm,” Geralt says.

Link writes in the sand again: “Going there. Tomorrow or now.”

Geralt makes sure he’s facing Link when he speaks. “Tomorrow’s fine.”

Link nods, and flops down onto the wolf, who rolls over and licks his cheek.

The horse wanders a little ways down the beach, munching on the dune grass. Link is asleep within minutes. The wolf eyes Geralt. There’s an intelligence in the creature’s eyes that is unnerving: it stares at him evenly, halfway curious, halfway challenging him to just _ try _ and mess with him or Link. 

Link hadn’t taken back his weird little magic block, so Geralt taps at it a little. The map shrinks in size, and Geralt stares at the glowing blue continent displayed.

He recognizes none of it. None of the names, the terrain, the shape of the whole continent, nothing.

Fuck.


End file.
